Originally Posted by
TheOddOne
Our school PA28 O360 is at 2150 hours, in it's 1st extension. It's also at 13 years, in it's 2nd calendar extension. We expect to reach both the end of the hours and calendar extensions this Autumn (nicely timed) We've done about 1,000 hours on this 1976 aircraft in the 3 1/2 years we've owned it. We will send the engine for overhaul to 'zero-time' it in compliance with doing flying training in the UK. At the same time, we're having a 'paint-off' respray, including complete overhaul of the engine bearer/leg assembly and firewall. I've quotes from 2 popular UK engine overhaul facilities and I'm minded to go for the more expensive quote, based on recent experiences of other people. We've a budget of £40k for this exercise and expect it to take 3 months, though both places have quoted much less time (yes, right!) I'd like it to come out cheaper of course, both quotes together come to less than my budget but my experience adds 15% to any quote. There's an impressive list of parts that are replaced 'new', but I suspect that in some cases means components that have been overhauled rather than straight from the manufacturers. I've chosen the paint shop in part because they've recently done a fantastic job on a couple of aircraft locally and because they have the facility for removing and refitting the engine as part of the deal.
None of this is cheap, but we've built in to our hourly rate for this work and have the money ready. I think £6 an hour for an engine fund is a bit optimistic, I've got £10 in my budget. If you get change, great!
By the way, whenever one of our members says they're thinking of buying a plane, I say find out the cost of a replacement engine and have that cash available. Some insurers now do a betterment scheme, but selling an aircraft with no engine is going to be difficult!
TOO
I would recommend you look at the advantages of a factory exchange engine and compare your quotations. If you do a factory exchange you will get the upgrade to roller tappets free of charge and the biggest historical cause of premature failure of the engine is removed.
The engine you get from the factory will be at a guaranteed fixed price. If you order it and specify a delivery date it will help your cash flow too.
With some overhaul shops if your crankcase or crankshaft needs rework you are likely to have a large increase in the quoted price. Will any reworks be in accordance with the Lycoming overhaul manual. Welding, line boring crankcases and grinding crankshafts or camshafts do not appear in the Lycoming overhaul manual. Once a crankcase has developed a fatigue crack in one place, it is only time others will appear. It is telling you it has reached the end of its fatigue life. It needs to be replaced not patched up.
Be certain any overhaul shop builds your engine and gives you a log book entry stating in qualifies for the TBO extension as per the requirements of SB1009.
By regulation all factory engines must include all ADs, SBs AND Service Instructions, this does not apply to field overhauled engines. It might not sound much but the mandatory inclusion of Service Instructions mean in reality a much larger proportion of a factory engine will have of new parts in it.
Lastly compare warranty. With a factory engine you can have a warranty all the way to TBO if you fly a lot of hours in a year.
It is a lot of money you are going to spend, just make sure you do your homework and compare apples with apples.
Best of luck and I hope you end up with a great flying machine